JAMB: Mixed reactions trail release of 2018 UTME results

Some candidates of the 2018 Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examinations ( UTME)
have reacted to the results released by the Joint Admission Matriculation Board
(JAMB) on Tuesday.

The candidates spoke in separate
interviews on Wednesday in Abuja.

Recalled that the board initially
released the first batch of results in the first week of the examination and
over 1.5 million was later released, on Tuesday, March 20. While many had been
able to check their results, others complained that their results were yet to
be displayed or they were still finding it difficult to check their results.
Chibuke Okafor, a candidate, described the entire process the results had to
undergo as fair. According to him, unlike the previous exercise, the wait for
the 2018 Examination results had a lot of mixed feelings associated with it. “I
scored 249 and am happy with the result since it is above the cut off mark.

“At a point, one was not sure what
to expect again because it was taking longer than usual before the results were
released. “Especially, when I realised that some people that wrote after me
were able to get their results before I did. “Before now, every time I checked,
it was either saying I did not sit for the exam or that my result was not
ready, until I could finally access it last night. “ I think the exam was fair;
while a lot of us had high scores, few of my friends scored quite low points,”
he said. Another candidate, Lucy Ibrahim, told NAN that she scored quite high
but a little less than her previous score. Ibrahim, who sat for the examination
a second time because she couldn’t get admissions in 2017, said that her 2018
score was satisfactorily. She described the examination as tough, however,
noted that it was nothing, compared to the tension of waiting patiently for the
results to come out, almost a week later. Similarly, Alice Adigun, another
candidate said that the wait for the release of the results almost gave a lot
of candidates “hypertension.” According to her, she and her younger sister sat
for the examinations a day in between but her sister’s result was yet to be
displayed on the JAMB portal. Adigun, who lauded JAMB’s efforts to ensure
fairness in the entire process, however, urged the board to work speedily on
the results of other awaiting candidates while also praying for successful
admission process. Meanwhile, some parents had complained of the challenge in
accessing the JAMB portal to check results. Mr Shemang Aboi, a civil servant,
said that he had in the past week, continuously been checking for the result of
his son but could not access the board’s portal. “I do not know if it is
network problem from my ends or that too many people are trying to access it at
the same time; maybe because it was not ready then, because each time I try, it
gives me different information. “Now that it is confirmed that they had
successfully released the results, I will try again and hope to be successful,”
Aboi said. Similarly, Mr Moses Ibanga told NAN that it took him almost an hour
before he could finally access the results of his daughter from the JAMB site.
He commended the board for its efforts towards ensuring a smooth and successful
examination process but urged the board to do more sensitisation to the
grassroots in order to give people more awareness on its system. NAN reports
that 1, 662, 762 candidates registered for the 2018 UTME and 1,502,978 results
had so far been released while 112,331 others were still undergoing screening.
The board said 350 out of the outstanding results were that of the blind
candidates, which would be released soon, while 111,981 results are being
withheld for further screening. (NAN)